


Things We Believe

by icarus_chained



Category: Iron Man (Movies), The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Aftermath, Comrades in Arms, Doubt, Friendship, Gen, Pain, Trust
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-09-16
Updated: 2012-09-16
Packaged: 2017-11-14 08:22:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,604
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/513231
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/icarus_chained/pseuds/icarus_chained
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There are things Rhodey believes in, and then there are things he has <i>faith</i> in. And one of them is that Tony Stark is an idiot, and needs all the help he can get.</p><p>Tony & Rhodey, and the aftermath of Avengers (and Tony's confrontation with Steve on the Helicarrier).</p>
            </blockquote>





	Things We Believe

**Author's Note:**

> ... I am apparently really, _really_ in a Rhodey sort of mood, at the minute.

There were things James Rhodes believed in. There were also things he had faith in. There was a difference between them. They were not, not exactly, the same thing.

What he _believed_ in, was the uniform. The uniform, and everything that it stood for. He remembered telling Tony that, once. Remembered the plane, leaning drunkenly against a Tony that was only pretending to listen to him, a Tony that was humouring him at best, telling him earnestly about the value of a uniform right before everything went so spectacularly to hell that nothing, _nothing_ , was ever the same again. Yeah. He remembered that.

He believed in the uniform. He believed in the service of something greater than yourself. He believed in fighting to protect a people and an ideal, he believed in the rule of law, he believed in accountability and responsibility and duty. He believed in laying down your life, he believed in standing beside people willing to lay down theirs, he believed in doing your damnedest to make sure that no life was laid down that didn't have to be. He believed in serving, and in the symbols of that service. He believed, at the very base of it, in the uniform.

Tony never had. That's what he'd thought, explaining himself earnestly to a Tony he knew for a damn fact wasn't listening to a word he said. Tony didn't believe in duty, Tony didn't believe in responsibility, and Tony sure as hell did not believe in service. You mentioned a uniform to him, he practically broke out in hives. Tony did not _do_ responsibility, and though he was the best possible friend in the world once you got over the urge to paste his smug grin around his face, he didn't do the laying down his life for his friend. That, Rhodey'd thought, had been beyond him.

Guess Afghanistan had been a learning experience for all of them.

And it had. Oh, it had. In more ways than one. Because Afghanistan was where Rhodey learned something more than what he believed in. Afghanistan was where he'd learned what he had _faith_ in.

Three months. Three goddamn fucking months. And there had been blood at the site, blood but no body, no Tony Stark lying there next to the soldiers that had died around him. Just blood, enough for a potentially fatal wound, and no body.

Three months was too long, way too fucking long, when what you knew was blood, and kidnap, and captivity, and what you _didn't_ know was who, and where, and how fucking bad. What you didn't know was what they were doing to him, how long he lasted, how long he could hope to last, when he'd no goddamn training and no hope and no way out, and how the _fuck_ could you believe in anything, knowing that? How could you believe, when there was no way to find him, and no hope for his survival?

But he had. Rhodey _had_. Days became weeks, weeks became months, and there was nothing but silence from an empty desert and Tony's blood fading out of the sand, but he'd ... he'd known, somehow, someway, that the stubborn, aggravating bastard wasn't dead. That Tony was alive, and Tony was fighting, and he'd no damn proof and no damn evidence that Tony even _could_ , but he'd known. He'd had ... faith.

He'd had a duty, and he believed in it. Something to serve, something to fight for, something that he knew in his heart and down to his bones was worth laying down his life for.

But when that explosion lit up every surveillance post in Afghanistan, when some unknown force had blown a terrorist armoury sky high three months after blood had faded into sand, Rhodey'd known, with a bright, pure clarity, who it was. Who it had to be. And for all that he hadn't dared hope, and for all that he'd lived three months with a ball of terror in his gut, and for all he'd had no evidence it was even possible ... he hadn't been surprised.

You believed in a thing you knew to your bones was worth fighting for. You had _faith_ in a thing you trusted would fight for itself. And, maybe, for you.

He had faith in Tony. He had faith that no matter what happened to him, no matter how much Tony didn't know and couldn't be expected to know, no matter how hopeless things were, Tony Stark would find a way around whatever the hell had gotten in his way, and make it home. Tony would make it home, and do his damnedest to make it right, and put his life on the line for yours when he had to.

And if Tony sometimes needed a little help with that, if he could only get himself so far and no further, well. After Afghanistan ... there'd been things beyond the uniform that Rhodey _believed_ in, too. Things beyond the uniform that he would lay down his life for, without a second thought.

A learning experience, for all of them. So much, so fucking much, between that drunken plane ride where Rhodey'd thought Tony didn't have it in him to believe, and this place, this time, in the aftermath of the world almost fucking ending.

"I don't know how to do this," Tony said, leaning drunkenly against him in a partially-repaired penthouse, four weeks after flying a nuke into space. Explaining softly and earnestly, to a Rhodey he thought was humouring him at best, why what he'd done had terrified him. "I'm not a soldier, Rhodey. I can't _do_ this."

"You've never let that stop you before," Rhodey noted wryly, carefully pulling the glass out of Tony's hands before he dropped it, letting the man's head drop onto his shoulder. "You flew a nuke into space, Tony, and took out an alien mothership. For your first official mission, that's pretty good."

And it was flippant, because you had to be, with Tony, you couldn't let things get too serious too fast or he actually did break out in hives, but under that ... 

He had faith. He did have faith.

Tony looked up at him. Tipped his head back blearily to stare at Rhodey, sliding awkwardly over his shoulder. And there was pain, in his eyes, and more doubt that anyone who wasn't Pepper or JARVIS or Rhodey would ever, _ever_ get to see.

"Don't be stupid, Rhodey," Tony growled, his head heavy on Rhodey's arm. "Any idiot can fly a plane, and an idiot can point a gun. If that was _hard_ , SI would have been out of business a long, long time ago."

Rhodey felt his expression tighten, felt his jaw stiffen faintly. Because Tony Stark was a goddamn moron sometimes, and a exercise in fucking patience.

"You're not just any old idiot with a gun, Tony," he said. Clipped and hard, and making sure that was _all_ he said. He was going to leave aside the 'any idiot with a plane' part. For now. He was going to leave it aside, for _now_.

Tony looked away. Tony's eyes creased in pain, over a mouth creasing in a casual smile, and he looked away.

"I'm not a soldier," he said, softly. Hunting around for his glass, not looking at Rhodey. "You know Rogers had a few things to say, on the Helicarrier? Goddamn Captain America. And I hit him back, because fuck that shit, but he was right too." He looked at Rhodey then. Looked back, and Rhodey hated that smile, he'd always hated that smile, Tony smiled like that when he was dying. "I was actually listening, you know. When you told me what the uniform meant. When you told me what being a _soldier_ meant." The smile creased, went bright and wry and rueful. "Fuck, Rhodey. You think I could ever do that? You think I could ever _be_ that?"

Because Rhodey'd thought Tony didn't believe, didn't have the capacity to believe, couldn't put on a uniform, couldn't take responsibility, couldn't lay down his life, couldn't serve beside other men and women ready to lay down theirs. Couldn't understand what it _meant_ , to be ready to lay that down. Because Rhodey'd leaned drunkenly against him on a luxury plane, and tried to explain to a man he thought wasn't listening why he did what he did, and why it mattered to him. Why the uniform mattered.

He looked at Tony. At this man he believed in, this man he had faith in, this friend he'd buried in the desert and seen come back in a ball of fire like a damn phoenix. He looked at that man, with his stupid smile and his eyes creased in pain.

And he thought that the worst damn thing about faith ... was how it didn't stop.

"You're an idiot, Tony," he said. Because you had to. You had to lead with that, with Tony, you had to understand that that was the base of him. Beneath the genius, and the courage, and stubborn refusal to fail, was an _idiot_. 

Tony blinked at him. Startled, blinking rapidly, and his smile flickered up to something more real, flashed up to startled amusement, because there was nothing Tony appreciated more than someone who stood the hell up to him. Hell, he'd fallen for Pepper, hadn't he? Proof, right there.

"You became a soldier the second you put on the damn suit, and used it for something other than joyriding," Rhodey told him, because Tony was so fucking _slow_ , sometimes. "There's no chain of command, and you never met a damn rule you didn't love breaking, but the armour ... You put on a uniform, Tony. You took responsibility, and you fought to protect something, and you signed up with SHIELD, and you served with people you trusted to lay down their lives, and you laid down yours so they wouldn't have to, and what the fuck did you think I _meant_ , if I didn't mean that?"

Tony didn't answer. Sat frozen, in a room only partially repaired, and stared at him with eyes frozen somewhere between pain and need and utter terror. Because Tony believed, Tony believed down to his bones, Rhodey knew that now, knew it after Afghanistan, but he'd never had any faith. Tony'd never had faith in anything, and definitely not in himself.

Jesus, Rhodey loved him. You had to, you fucking had to, how else could you believe when there was no reason to, and nothing to say he'd even survived?

He stood up. Detached himself carefully from Tony, from the man staring at him in something close to fear, and stood up so he could face Tony properly. So he could stand over him, and meet his eyes head on.

"You listen to all the wrong things, you know that?" he said, and it wasn't flippant, not at all, there were times when you needed to stop pandering to Tony's sensitivities, and tell him things to his face. "You listen to people tell you you're not worth shit, you listen to poison from people who don't know you from Adam and people trying their best to kill you, and you don't listen at all to the _important_ things." He shook his head, faintly aggravated. "It's annoying as hell, you know that?"

Tony's mouth twitched. Curved, faintly, and Rhodey almost let himself smile at him, almost let himself answer. But not yet. Not just yet.

"So what's the important thing?" Tony asked, and he was amused, he was laughing, but there was that glittering thing under it, that shining, hopeful thing that the man never let anyone _see_. 

Rhodey ... felt his shoulders drop, and a swarm of things flicker across his face. Pity, and love, and annoyance, and the strange, desperate faith that had lived in his gut since he'd stood over blood faded into sand.

"Being a soldier means not fighting alone," he said, softly, and watched Tony flinch. "I told you, back when you were dying. You didn't listen to me. Which maybe doesn't surprise me." He grimaced faintly, a flash of pain, and shook his head. "You don't have to do this alone, Tony. I said it, and I meant it, and even if it's not me, you went out with five other people, and when you fucking fell out of the sky, one of them _caught_ you." He paused, smiled a little. "I've got to get around to thanking him, by the way. I might owe him some, for that."

Tony managed a grin, summoned it up from somewhere. "I'll take you down later," he said, waving a hand absently. "You'll like him. He's a good guy, Bruce."

"Yeah," Rhodey agreed, quietly. "Yeah, he is. Maybe they all are. And one of them caught you, and maybe he did that for a _reason_ , you think?"

And Tony looked at him, and Tony didn't say anything, and maybe the worst thing about faith wasn't the places where it didn't stop, but the places where it didn't _start_.

"You can do this," he said, because you couldn't do a damn thing about faith, but if you gave Tony a job, he'd damn well do it, no matter what. "You _will_ do it, because I've never seen you back down from a challenge, ever. And they'll have your back, because you'll have theirs, and if they don't ..."

If they didn't, because Obie hadn't, Obie had had Tony's love and his faith and his life in his hands, and he'd let it _drop_.

"If they don't, I'll come get you," Rhodey said, at last. Because there were things you believed in, strong enough to fight for. "Just ... stay alive long enough for me to reach you, and I promise whatever happens, I'll come get you." Three months and a near-fatal injury late, maybe, or after a hundred misunderstandings and a knock-down, drag-out fight, but he would. And Tony would be alive when he got there, because that was what faith was _for_. 

And then the Avengers, or whoever the hell had dropped the ball and left Tony to fall, would find out that while Rhodey wasn't Tony Stark, he still had a big-ass suit of armour, and something he believed in enough to get a little biblical for. 

... And If there was no other reward for this conversation, there'd at least be the fact that this was the longest continuous period he'd ever seen Tony lost for words. 

Rhodey sighed, and dropped into a crouch in front of Tony, reaching up to grip the man's knee with one hand. Watching the man watch him, watching the swarm of way too many things in a face that rarely showed them, but was too drunk and too pained and too fucking hopeful to hide them now.

"You don't have to do this alone," he said again. With a small smile, wondering vaguely how many times, and in how many variations, he'd said it before. "And when I say it this time, do you think maybe you could _listen_ , for a change?"

And Tony _still_ didn't say anything, but this smile was smaller, and realer, and his hand reached up to rest over Rhodey's, so maybe ... Maybe, this once, Rhodey could give him the benefit of the doubt, and say he'd listened.

"Love you too, honey bear," Tony whispered, not nearly as facetiously as he should have, and Rhodey gripped his hand around a rueful smile.

Yeah. Yeah, he did. And that was, every time, the kicker of it.

Faith. Not for the faint of heart, he was _telling_ you.


End file.
